In an environment for treatment of patients, such as a hospital, the use of wireless patient monitoring devices is known. Such a wireless patient monitoring device typically comprises a sensor which is connected to the body of a patient and is adapted to retrieve patient physiological data. The wireless patient monitoring device comprises an emitter for sending the retrieved patient physiological data to a data reception device which typically comprises a bedside patient monitor. The patient monitor is adapted to receive the patient physiological data and comprises a screen which allows visual access to patient physiological data.
Additionally or alternatively, the wireless patient monitoring device is connected, using a wireless communication protocol, to a hospital network.
Prior to allowing the wireless patient monitoring device to send data to the bedside patient monitor and/or the hospital network, the wireless patient monitoring device must be paired to the receiving device of the bedside monitor and/or the hospital network and must be associated with the right patient. In a hospital environment, patient association, which means guaranteeing the right association between retrieved patient physiological data and a known patient, is one of the greatest concerns relating to the use of wireless patient monitoring. If patient association is not correctly performed, the wireless patient monitoring device will produce patient data and associate such data with the wrong patient.
According to the prior art, patient association comprises pairing between a wireless patient monitoring device and a data reception device, such as a bedside monitor, by entering a known patient monitoring device identity in the data reception device. Such known patient monitoring device identity is entered into a memory of the data reception device prior to use of the wireless patient monitoring device. The wireless patient monitoring device is adapted to send both retrieved patient physiological data and sensor identification data. Accordingly, the data reception device receives and processes sensor identification data with the aim of comparing the received sensor identification data with the stored known patient monitoring device identity. Such comparison allows the data reception device to verify whether the patient physiological data received is being sent by the appropriate wireless patient monitoring device.
The ability of the data reception device to compare stored known patient monitoring device identity with received sensor identification data constitutes a safety measure which guards against receiving patient physiological data from an unknown or non-identified wireless patient monitoring device.
The data reception device also comprises a memory for storing known patient identities. After confirmation that the data reception device is communicating with the right wireless patient monitoring device, the data reception device processes the received patient physiological data and combines this with the correct known patient identity stored in a memory of the data reception device.
A data reception device according to the prior art is provided with an input device for entering the identity of a wireless patient monitoring device.
A first manner of entering the identity of a wireless patient monitoring device is the use of a keyboard, wherein an operator is required to manually type in the known identity of a wireless patient monitoring device. A disadvantage of the use of such known input devices is the risk of operator-related errors. For example, an operator could easily mistype the identity of a wireless patient monitoring device, with no control system available to automatically correct such errors.
A second manner of entering the identity of a wireless patient monitoring device into the memory of a data reception device is the use of specific identifiers or tags, such as barcodes. The information on identifiers can be read with specific readers, such as barcode readers. A disadvantage of the use of such specific readers is that they are relatively expensive and voluminous. Data reception devices, such as bedside monitors, are generally becoming smaller, with reduced size increasing the user-friendliness and mobility of data reception devices. The size of known readers, such as barcode readers, tends to be disproportionately large compared to the size of data reception devices.
In the prior art, Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) techniques are used to allow pairing between wireless patient monitoring devices and data reception devices. A disadvantage of RFID techniques, such as Near Field Communication (NFC) technology, is that they are relatively expensive. Enabling wireless patient monitoring devices with known RFID techniques means that they become relatively expensive to produce and thus precludes the use of wireless patient monitoring devices as disposables.
In practice, a patient to whom a wireless patient monitoring device is attached may be moved from a first environment, wherein the wireless patient monitoring device communicates with a first data reception device, to a second location wherein the wireless patient monitoring device communicates with a further data reception device. This can occur, for example, when a patient is moved from a first hospital room to a second hospital room. Where a wireless patient monitoring device is to send retrieved patient physiological data to a new data reception device, the wireless patient monitoring device and the data reception device must once again follow a procedure to allow pairing of the two devices in order to safeguard correct data transmission and reception between the devices. It will be evident that each time a new connection between a wireless patient monitoring device and a data reception device needs to be established, the procedures and techniques that allow pairing according to the prior art are relatively time-consuming and open to operator error.
It is possible to link the retrieved patient physiological data to a patient identity, in which case the patient identity can be used to retrieve a patient file available in a hospital network and to link the retrieved patient physiological data directly to the appropriate patient file. Where physiological data is to be directly linked to a patient file, patient identity should be entered in the wireless patient monitoring device.
In view of the identified disadvantages of the known systems and devices, there is an apparent need for a safe and inexpensive input device for entering an identity of a wireless patient monitoring device.